Portal:Renewable energy
 
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The Renewable Energy Portal
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Introduction Renewable energy (or green energy) is energy from renewable natural resources that are replenished on a human timescale. Using renewable energy technologies helps with climate change mitigation, energy security, and also has some economic benefits. Commonly used renewable energy types include solar energy, wind power, hydropower, bioenergy and geothermal power. Renewable energy installations can be large or small. They are suited for urban as well as rural areas. Renewable energy is often deployed together with further electrification. This has several benefits: electricity can move heat and vehicles efficiently, and is clean at the point of consumption. Variable renewable energy sources are those that have a fluctuating nature, such as wind power and solar power. In contrast, controllable renewable energy sources include dammed hydroelectricity, bioenergy, or geothermal power. Renewable energy systems are rapidly becoming more efficient and cheaper. As a result, their share of global energy consumption is increasing. A large majority of worldwide newly installed electricity capacity is now renewable. In most countries, photovoltaic solar or onshore wind are the cheapest new-build electricity. Renewable energy can help reduce energy poverty in rural and remote areas of developing countries, where lack of energy access is often hindering economic development. Renewable energy resources exist all over the world. This is in contrast to fossil fuels resources which are concentrated in a limited number of countries. There are also other renewable energy technologies that are still under development, for example enhanced geothermal systems, concentrated solar power, cellulosic ethanol, and marine energy. From 2011 to 2021, renewable energy grew from 20% to 28% of global electricity supply. Use of fossil energy shrank from 68% to 62%, and nuclear from 12% to 10%. The share of hydropower decreased from 16% to 15% while power from sun and wind increased from 2% to 10%. Biomass and geothermal energy grew from 2% to 3%. In 2022, renewables accounted for 30% of global electricity generation, up from 21% in 1985. Many countries around the world already have renewable energy contributing more than 20% of their total energy supply. Some countries generate over half their electricity from renewables. A few countries generate all their electricity from renewable energy. National renewable energy markets are projected to continue to grow strongly in the 2020s and beyond. The deployment of renewable energy is being hindered by massive fossil fuel subsidies. In 2022 the International Energy Agency (IEA) requested all countries to reduce their policy, regulatory, permitting and financing obstacles for renewables. This would increase the chances of the world reaching net zero carbon emissions by 2050. According to the IEA, to achieve net zero emissions by 2050, 90% of global electricity generation will need to be produced from renewable sources. Whether nuclear power is renewable energy or not is still controversial. There are also debates around geopolitics, the metal and mineral extraction needed for solar panels and batteries, possible installations in conservation areas and the need to recycle solar panels. Although most renewable energy sources are sustainable, some are not. For example, some biomass sources are unsustainable at current rates of exploitation. (Full article...) Selected article - The Renewable Energy Sources Act or EEG (German: Erneuerbare-Energien-Gesetz) is a series of German laws that originally provided a feed-in tariff (FIT) scheme to encourage the generation of renewable electricity. The EEG 2014 specified the transition to an auction system for most technologies which has been finished with the current version EEG 2017. The EEG first came into force on 1 April 2000 and has been modified several times since. The original legislation guaranteed a grid connection, preferential dispatch, and a government-set feed-in tariff for 20 years, dependent on the technology and size of project. The scheme was funded by a surcharge on electricity consumers, with electricity-intensive manufacturers and the railways later being required to contribute as little as 0.05 ¢/kWh. For 2017, the unabated EEG surcharge is 6.88 ¢/kWh. In a study in 2011, the average retail price of electricity in Germany, among the highest in the world, stood at around 35 ¢/kWh. The EEG was preceded by the Electricity Feed-in Act (1991) which entered into force on 1 January 1991. This law initiated the first green electricity feed-in tariff scheme in the world. The original EEG is credited with a rapid uptake of wind power and photovoltaics (PV) and is regarded nationally and internationally as an innovative and successful energy policy measure. The act also covers biomass (including cogeneration), hydroelectricity, and geothermal energy. (Full article...)Quotations -
– Amory Lovins, Soft Energy Paths, 1977, pp. 38–40. Main topicsRenewable energy sourcesGeneralRenewable energy commercialization · Smart grid · Timeline of sustainable energy research 2020–present Renewable energy by countryList of countries by electricity production from renewable sources
WikiProjectsWikiProjects connected with renewable energy: Selected image - Tokai University's solar car "Tokai Challenger", the winner of the 2009 World Solar Challenge in Australia. Selected biography -Amory Bloch Lovins (born November 13, 1947) is an American writer, physicist, and former chairman/chief scientist of the Rocky Mountain Institute. He has written on energy policy and related areas for four decades, and served on the US National Petroleum Council, an oil industry lobbying group, from 2011 to 2018. Lovins has promoted energy efficiency, the use of renewable energy sources, and the generation of energy at or near the site where the energy is actually used. Lovins has also advocated a "negawatt revolution" arguing that utility customers don't want kilowatt-hours of electricity; they want energy services. In the 1990s, his work with Rocky Mountain Institute included the design of an ultra-efficient automobile, the Hypercar. He has provided expert testimony and published 31 books, including Reinventing Fire, Winning the Oil Endgame, Small is Profitable, Brittle Power, and Natural Capitalism. (Full article...)Did you know? -... that REN21, the Renewable Energy Policy Network for the 21st Century, is a policy network that provides a forum for international leadership in renewable energy policy, in order to share knowledge and facilitate the rapid growth of renewable energy technologies in developing countries and industrialised economies ? The network launched in June 2005, operates from offices in Paris, France, and is provided by the United Nations Environment Programme and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für International Zusammenarbeit in collaboration with the International Energy Agency. Since 2005 REN21 has produced an annual Renewables Global Status Report, with Eric Martinot and Janet Sawin as lead authors. General images -The following are images from various renewable energy-related articles on Wikipedia.
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![Image 44Concentrated solar panels are getting a power boost. Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) will be testing a new concentrated solar power system – one that can help natural gas power plants reduce their fuel usage by up to 20 percent.[needs update] (from Solar energy)](/wiki/File:Photo_of_the_Week-_Boosting_Solar_Technology_(8722948189).jpg)
